A/N: Another ficlet for my good friend KittyNebula, based on her prompt: Out on a con, Eliot & Parker get stuck inside a rather tightly confined space. Bring on the hot and heavy ;)

Disclaimer: All recognisable characters belong to John Rogers, Chris Downey, Dean Devlin, TNT, and other folks that aren't me.

Close Quarters

When the goons decided to double-back, Eliot knew he could fight his way out. It was Nate that told him not to. They still needed the hitter's character for the con; if his cover was blown it would make things beyond complicated, maybe even impossible. Against his better judgement and with a growl of indignation, Eliot yanked open the door to the closet and shoved himself inside. Back against the wall, he practically held his breath in the dark, waiting for the coast to be clear. He got the shock of his life when the air vent above his head suddenly clattered open and a slim, blonde projectile came tumbling out. As agile as she was, the space she was both coming from and into were not large. Eliot's arms shot out to catch Parker on instinct. She landed on slightly unsteady legs in front of him, his arms around her and their noses practically touching, such was the tightness of space in the closet.

"Eliot, I..." she began, but he immediately shushed her.

The bad guys were in the room now, he heard the distinctive foot-steps and then voices. He and Parker would have to be completely still and silent until they were gone. One false move, they would be found and everything would be blown. That couldn't happen. The client needed them to pull this con off, else lose everything.

Parker was in shock for the first few seconds. She had planned to get as far as the hatch above the tiny room and hopefully get Eliot out the way she came in. As it turned out, said hatch was not in any way fixed in place. She leaned a little weight on it and fell straight through. It was pretty lucky it was the right closet. Parker had the grace and skill of a cat when it came to landing smoothly but this was a very small space and she hadn't entirely been ready for the drop. Now she and Eliot were in very, very close quarters and it felt... strange. Parker wasn't sure how she would describe it exactly, not bad but not good either, just different.

She and Eliot never got this close. Parker wasn't freaked out by it, because she was used to Eliot touching her by now. He taught her self-defence, which necessitated bodily contact, plus he had patched up minor wounds on her, and she'd assisted with the more serious or awkward injuries he'd had too. This was different, this was intimate, for lack of a better word, and Parker wasn't sure how she felt about that.

The truth was, Eliot was having similar thoughts. He never got this close to Parker. A hundred other woman he could name, oh yeah, but never his little thief. They didn't have that relationship, and they never, ever should, he knew that. Of course, that didn't stop him from being a man with eyes and feelings and all.

Parker was a very attractive woman. Crazy as anything, but a good person, and hotter than hell, that was hard for anyone to deny. Having her lithe form pressed up against him, his arms around her, and her face achingly close to his own, it was difficult not to think all those obvious thoughts, feel those base urges stirring in him. Eliot convinced himself, Parker could have no idea what she could do to a man without even trying.

Actually, he was right. The thing mostly on Parker's mind right now was the eyes she was staring into. Eliot had blue eyes, she knew that, because it was just something you noticed about people, or at least it was something Parker noticed. What she had never known before was just how deeply and hypnotically blue those eyes really were. Having never been this close before, she had no way to know, but now she felt as if she were drowning in a shade she couldn't name, deeper than the ocean, more beautiful than any sky she ever saw.

At some point they had started breathing in synch. Eliot noticed when his own hair shifted every time he exhaled. That was Parker, matching him breath for breath. Her body shifted slightly against his own, and his hand flexed instinctively on her back. he watched her swallow in the dim light, and bite her lip like she was considering something serious. If they could dare to talk, Eliot might ask her what was wrong, but honestly, all he could think of right now was pulling her tighter against him and kissing those lips that were so close he imagined he could already taste them.

Parker didn't understand what she was feeling, or rather she did and that was why she was freaking out inside. Stab first, run second, those were her natural reactions to being this close to people, to men in particular. Eliot was different, he always had been. He was safety and home. Right now he was so solid and hot... The room was hot, enclosed, and it made Parker shudder in the best way to think about it. She never thought she'd find anything better than being squeezed into an enclosed space, but being in it with Eliot was an improvement she hadn't expected. She watched his eyes close and wondered why. Immediately she missed the blueness that had so enticed her, but his lips looked just as good in that moment, and Parker didn't waste a second in testing out the very next theory that fell into her head unbidden.

Eliot wasn't expecting the kiss, but it took all of a nanosecond for him to realise it was happening and give into it. There was no room to move, and no sound could be made. Eliot kept himself in check and forced himself to be Parker's good sense at the same time as his own. Not that he wanted to boast or anything, but if she so much as moaned, they'd be found out. Still, it was too hard to stop kissing her.. and didn't that just have one too many meanings right now!

"Guys?! Guys!"

It took a combination of Nate, Sophie, and Hardison all yelling in unison in their ears for Eliot and Parker to part a while later. Could've been thirty seconds or ten minutes, it would've been difficult for either side of that kiss to have guessed, and neither was exactly breathing too quietly when they parted.

"What?!" Parker snapped anyway.

"Coast is clear," Nate repeated what he had already told them three times. "Is something wrong in there?"

Eliot stared at Parker and she stared right on back. She looked as stunned by what just happened between them as he felt, and yet she was still just as close, every beautiful curve of her body pulled tight against his solid muscles.

"No, nothin' wrong," he smiled when she did the same.

"Nope, everything's good. Very good," she grinned.

"Might take us a while to get out of here though, Nate," Eliot lied, an eyebrow raised in question to Parker who continued to smile widely.

"Yeah, we might need a little more time," she agreed, shifting her body against Eliot's own, watching his eyes burn from what she was doing to him.

There was a brief confirmation that they could take as long as they needed before both Eliot and Parker pulled the buds from their ears and fell back into a moment neither wanted to get out of.

"This'd be easier out of the closet," he told her breathlessly, kissing a fiery path down her neck.

"Where's the fun in easy?" she chuckled, then gasped as he sucked on her jugular.

There were no more words after that, but it was still a good thing the bad guys were long gone. A lack of talking didn't exactly mean they were quiet.

The End

The author would like to thank you for your continued support. Your review has been posted.